Have you ever searched a brand or company and couldn’t find a consumer review to validate if they were worth your time?
Consumers
As consumers, we invariable seek peer opinions and reviews for many services and products. While we may not all do this consistently, we will check out reviews once in a while. For some, there is no buying if reviews haven’t been consulted.
We seek reviews each where we trust them the most. Some look for reviews on sites dedicated to them such as Yelp!, Zomato (formerly UrbanSpoon), TripAdvisor and RateMD. Others will look at reviews where they’re already spending time such as Google (right hand side business presentation), Facebook and Yellow Pages.
Brands
Now, as a business or brand, do you have consumer reviews across multiple platforms? What are you doing to get consumer reviews?
You should ASK FOR REVIEWS. You should ask for reviews every time you see a client leave with a big smile on their face, or if you ever get a call or email from a satisfied customer. Whenever you see a happy customer, ask them to write up a review for you.
“Where do you want it?” is a likely question from the client and your answer should be “wherever you feel most comfortable, or where you would look for reviews” (you being the client). You ideally want many positive reviews on all possible platforms.
Why many reviews and why all over the place?
You want many reviews to weigh out any negative ones you’ll invariably get. Although we don’t wish bad reviews, they’re good in the mix to demonstrate you don’t censor them. That way, consumers can make up their own mind based on the number of available reviews.
Why should you get many reviews on many different platforms? Because your consumers likely use many different platforms. Because they trust these platforms differently. You want to look good wherever they decide to seek you out.
For more tips and tricks, check out my Digital Brand Identity Management service, otherwise known as Reputation Management, which not only ensures you look good at first, but helps you stay in this direction as you evolve.
